Tetralogia
（
τετραλογία). A Greek term given to the group of four plays
which the poets produced in rivalry with each other at the dramatic contests held at the feast
of Dionysus. After the introduction of the Satyric
Drama (q.v.), this, or a drama of a comparatively cheerful character (such as the
Alcestis of Euripides), formed the fourth piece of three tragedies or of a
trilogy. By a tetralogy is more particularly meant such a group of four dramas as had
belonged to the same cycle of myths, and had thus formed a connected whole. Of such a kind
were the tetralogies of Aeschylus. It is doubtful, however, whether he found this type of
connected tetralogy already in use or was the first to introduce it. Sophocles abolished the
connection between the several pieces, and Euripides followed his example. A complete
tetralogy is not extant, although a trilogy exists in the
Oresteia of
Aeschylus, consisting of the tragedies
Agamemnon, Choëphorae, and
Eumenides; the satyric play appended to it was the
Proteus. See
Drama;
Trilogia.
